Alfred Hermann Fried

Alfred Hermann Fried, 1911

Alfred Hermann Fried (November 11, 1864 in Vienna, Austria- May 5, 1921 in Vienna), was an Austrian Jewish pacifist, publicist, journalist, co-founder of the German peace movement, and co-winner (with Tobias Asser) of the Nobel Peace Prize in 1911.

Influenced by Bertha von Suttner (Nobel Peace Prize for 1905) Fried became interested in the peace movement and co-founded the Deutsche Friedensgesellschaft (German Peace Society) with her. He also edited its major publication, Monatliche Friedenskorrespondenz (Monthly Peace Correspondence), from 1894 to 1899. After convincing Baroness von Suttner to serve as editor, he started a peace journal, naming it Die Waffen Nieder! (Lay Down Your Arms!), the title of the Baroness' famous 1889 antiwar novel.

Fried was a prominent member of the Esperanto-movement. In 1903 he published the book Lehrbuch der internationalen Hilfssprache Esperanto (Textbook of the International Language of Esperanto)

Life

Fried was born in Vienna to a Jewish family. At the age of 15 he left formal schooling to start work in a book store in Vienna. In 1883 he moved to Berlin, where he opened a book shop of his own in 1887.

It was during his time in Berlin that his political and social ideas began to be influenced by socialism. At the age of 27 he read a newspaper report about a peace society that had been formed by Baroness Bertha von Suttner in Vienna. He immediately wrote to the baroness proposing a peace journal that he would publish if she agreed to be the editor. The 48-year-old baroness was impressed with his boldness and enthusiasm and agreed to be editor.

Peace publisher

In 1892 the monthly journal titled Die Waffen Nieder! (Lay Down Your Arms!) made its debut. Fried used the title of the baroness' 1889 novel and she served as its editor until 1899. Fried and Baroness von Suttner remained friends for more than 20 years and he was at her beside when she died in 1914. The same year they started the journal they also collaborated on founding the German Peace Society.

Fried would eventually withdraw from the Society and returned to Vienna in 1903. When the baroness left the position of editor of Die Waffen Nieder! in 1899, Fried started the Die Friedenswarte (The Peace Watch), which he edited until his death.

Back in Vienna he became a prolific writer of newspaper articles on the cause for peace and began writing books. His two volume Handbuch der Friedensbewegung (Handbook of the Peace Movement) was the most comprehensive and authoritative work on peace issues prior to 1914.

In his peace theory Fried moved beyond the ethical appeal of earlier pacifists. In the early days of his cooperation with baroness von Suttner he wrote her about the value of a scholarly treatise on peace by a Dresden jurist. He told her that this treatise represented the "North", and that "while you gracious lady, with your style of attack, represents the South. Heart and Intellect, as if one or the other could work alone."

According to Fried it was wrong to emphasize disarmament because war and armaments were just symptoms of the the existing state in international anarchy. He believed that once there were organizations dedicated to relations between states then disarmament would follow naturally.

He was one of the fathers of the idea of a modern organization to assure world-wide peace. In another of his journals entitled Annuaire de la Vie Internationale he cited the evidence of the creation of the Pan-American Union and the Hague Conferences as evidence that history was progressing towards international bonds of cooperation. He recommended that the Pan-American Union serve as a model for Europe to move towards unification through the dissemination of cultural and economic developments.

Fried called his approach to Pacifism "scientific" and "revolutionary". Taking his cue from Karl Marx's socialist theory, he believed the laws of development would inevitably bring about the new international order. According to Fried it was the task of peace advocates to help their contemporaries to become aware of where history was moving and to help facilitate that movement by removing obstacles standing in the way of peace.

International recognition

International recognition for his ideas came in 1911 when he received the Nobel Peace Prize. That same year he received a grant from the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace that enabled him to begin distributing 10,000 copies of his Die Friedenswarte.

In 1913 he received an honorary doctor's degree from the Dutch University of Leiden and in 1914 he was given charge of arrangements for the Universal Peace Conference to be held in Vienna in September 1914. The conference was going to pay homage to the recently deceased baroness von Suttner in her home city.

Fried's efforts were partly responsible for the founding of the Verband für internationale Verstandigung [Society for International Understanding] in 1911. His theory of internationalism did not preclude nationalism. In the Pan-American movement he perceived a model for the preservation of national identity within international organization5. In keeping with this position, Fried defended Germany before World War I by chronicling Wilhelm II's positive attitude toward world peace and during the war by refuting what he considered to be unreasonable criticism of Germany in the French, British, and American press.

Fried was in Vienna when war broke out in 1914. Since pacifist activities there were curtailed by government censorship and intolerant public opinion, Fried shifted his organizational and journalistic work to Switzerland. He was active in efforts to ameliorate the conditions of prisoners of war and continued to publish Die Friedenswarte as a rallying point for international peace efforts. Accused of treason by the Austrian government, he was unable to return to Vienna until the war's end.

The war over, Fried published Mein Kriegstagebuch [My War Journal], a «diary» which he kept during the war years to record his sentiments and his activities, along with those of his colleagues in the peace movement; he expressed dissatisfaction with the peace settlement and organized a journalistic campaign against the Versailles Treaty; he tirelessly pressed the point in his propaganda for peace that the war was proof of the validity of his pacifistic analysis of world politics.

Esperanto

Fried was also a prominent member of the Esperanto movement. The movement formulated the idea of creating a universal second language, Esperanto. This way everyone in the world could correspond and spread international appreciation for other cultures.

In 1903 he published the book Lehrbuch der internationalen Hilfssprache Esperanto (Textbook of the International Language of Esperanto).

Death

Fried lost what wealth he possessed in the collapse of Austria-Hungary and died in poverty of a lung infection in Vienna at the age of fifty-seven.

Legacy

The Peace Watch“ is the magazine with the longest history in German-speaking regions in matters of peacekeeping and international organization. Since its foundation in 1899 by the future awardee of the Nobel Price of Peace Alfred H. Fried, “Peace Watch” represents a vital forum for the peace-scientific discussion.

Since 1996 “The Peace Watch” has been published by the Berliner Wissenschafts-Verlag (Berlin University Press); the editors are Knut Ipsen (Bochum/until 2006), Volker Rittberger (Tübingen) and Christian Tomuschat (Berlin).

Bibliography

• Fried, Alfred Hermann. 1915. The Fundamental Causes of the World War. International Conciliation, 91. New York: American Ass. for Internat. Conciliation. OCLC 249585939
• Fried, Alfred Hermann. 1912. The German emperor and the peace of the world. London: Hodder and Stoughton. OCLC 2698776
• Fried, Alfred H. 1972. Les bases du pacifisme: le pacifisme réformiste et le pacifisme "révolutionnaire. Garland library of war and peace. New York: Garland Pub. ISBN 0824004876
• Fried, Alfred H. 1972. Handbuch der Friedensbewegung. The Garland library of war and peace. New York: Garland Pub. ISBN 0824002407
• Pan-Amerika. Zürich, Orell-Füssli, 1910.
• Fried, Alfred H. 1971. The Restoration of Europe. The Garland library of war and peace. New York: Garland Pub. ISBN 0824003446
• Fried, Alfred Hermann. 1915. A Brief Outline of the Nature and Aims of Pacifism. International Conciliation, 1915, Special bulletin. New York: American Ass. for International Conciliation. OCLC 249585821
• Fried, Alfred H. 1899. The Diary of a Condemned Man. London: William Heinemann. OCLC 16992980
• Fried, Alfred H. 1918. International co-operation. Newcastle-on-Tyne: H. Richardson. OCLC 56991529
• Fried, Alfred H. 1914. A Few Lessons Taught by the Balkan war. International conciliation, no. 74. New York: American Association for International Conciliation. OCLC 1358707
• Fried, Alfred H., and John Richard Mez. 1915. A Dozen Truths About Pacifism. New York City: American Association for International Conciliation. OCLC 20536787

References

ISBN links support NWE through referral fees

• Abrams, Irwin. 1988. The Nobel Peace Prize and the Laureates: An Illustrated Biographical History, 1901-1987. Boston: G.K. Hall. ISBN 081618609X
• Göhring, Walter. 2006. Verdrängt und vergessen: Friedensnobelpreisträger Alfred Hermann Fried. Wien: Kremayr & Scheriau. ISBN 9783218007689
• Indiana University, Bloomington. 2006. A Century of Nobel Peace Prize Laureates, 1901-2005: from Peace Movements to the United Nations. Geneva: United Nations. ISBN 9211011108

External Links

• About Alfred Hermann Fried. Nobel-winners.com.
• Nobel biography. Nobelprize.org.
• Fried, Alfred Hermann Cartage.org.lb.
• Albert Fried Jewishvirtuallibrary.org.
• Register of the Alfred Hermann Fried Papers, 1914-1921 Oac.cdlib.org.
• The Restoration of Europe Books.google.com.
• The German Emperor and the Peace of the World Books.google.com.
• Famous Peacemakers Peacemakers.szm.com.
• The Nobel Peace Prize and the Laureates Books.google.com.
• The 1899 Hague Peace Conference Books.google.com.
• Kaiser Has Kept all Europe from War Query.nytimes.com.

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